We Spent $30,000 on a Gala That Netted $8,000 and Everyone Called It a Success (Womp Womp)

I need you to do some math with me.

Don’t panic. It’s not hard math.

It’s the kind of math you already know the answer to but have been actively avoiding because acknowledging it would mean having a very uncomfortable conversation with your board, your ED, or that one volunteer named Richard who has chaired the gala since before you were hired and will chair it until the sun burns out and the universe collapses in on itself.

Ready? Here we go.

Your annual gala costs $30,000 to produce.

Venue. Food. Drinks. DJ. Decorations. Printed programs. The centerpieces that took three committee meetings to select. The photographer. The AV rental. The raffle prizes you begged local businesses to donate. The silent auction software. The staff time…oh God, the staff time.

And after all of that?

After eleven months of planning and one very long Saturday night?

You netted $8,000.

Eight. Thousand. Dollars.

And then - and this is the part that makes me want to gently set my laptop on fire - everyone at the board meeting says: “What a great event! Can’t wait to do it again next year!”

Great event.

Eight thousand dollars.

Eleven months of your life.

Please know that I say the following with all the love in my heart:

You could have raised that money with a well-written letter and 10 phone calls.

And the event isn’t the problem. The expectation is.

Now look, before the event people come for me with pitchforks, I am not anti-event.

In fact, I am quite the opposite. I love events. I cut my fundraising teeth planning events. I’ve emceed events. I’ve eaten more banquet vegetable medley than any human should reasonably consume in one lifetime.

Events can be powerful. When they’re done right, they create energy, build community, tell your story, and yes - raise money.

But a ton of us in the nonprofit sector completely lost the plot because somewhere along the way, we started treating events as fundraising strategies instead of what they actually are.

Events are cultivation tools.

They’re friend-raisers.

They’re opportunities to get people in the room (hey, my last blog!) and connect them emotionally to your mission.

They are not supposed to be your primary revenue driver. And when they ARE your primary revenue driver, you end up on the hamster wheel: planning the next event before the last one is even debriefed, burning out your staff, exhausting your volunteers, and netting $8,000 for $30,000 worth of effort and calling it a win because the room looked pretty and people had fun.

But people having fun is not a fundraising outcome. People giving money is a fundraising outcome.

I know. I’m sorry. But someone had to say it.

Are there exceptions to this?

Of course there are, calm down. You probably have a VERY successful event. And you ROCK for it!

But here’s what you should think about as you lay down on my imaginary therapy couch:

You are allowed to not have an event.

And like Robin Williams’ character in Good Will Hunting, I’m going to say it over and over again until you cry into my arms: you are allowed to not have an event.

You are allowed to kill the gala.

You are allowed to cancel the golf tournament that barely breaks even.

You are allowed to say “we’re not doing the spaghetti feed this year” without the sky falling.

You are allowed to look at your fundraising calendar and ask the most dangerous question in nonprofit leadership: “What if we just…didn’t?”

What if, instead of spending damn near a year and $30,000 producing an event, you spent that time and a fraction of that money building donor relationships? Making phone calls. Writing personal letters. Having coffee meetings. Inviting people to see your work firsthand. Doing the analog, human, in-the-room work that we talked about last week.

What if you just asked people for money?

Directly. Personally. Without a game of Heads or Tails, and a centerpiece, and a raffle basket full of wine paired with your aunt’s “famous homemade jelly” that you are not quite sure is FDA approved for shelf storage longer than 2 weeks.

I know that sounds radical.

It’s not. It’s actually how most money gets raised. It’s just not as Instagram-friendly.

So What Do You Actually Do About It?

Here are three things you can do this week to get off the event hamster wheel and start raising more money with less stress.

1.    Run the Real Math on Your Last Event

Not the “we raised $38,000!” math. The actual math.

Total revenue brought in. Minus every expense - venue, food, printing, rentals, prizes, software, postage, every dime. Then take the result and divide it by the total number of staff hours spent planning, promoting, and executing the event.

That last number is your hourly fundraising rate for that event.

And I promise you: for most galas, golf tournaments, and spaghetti feeds, that number is going to make you deeply uncomfortable.

Like, “I could have made more money working a lunch shift at Pizza Ranch” uncomfortable.

Now do the same math for a single major gift conversation: one lunch, one follow-up call, one personalized letter. The hourly rate on that?

Astronomically higher.

I’m not saying this to make you feel bad. I’m saying this because you deserve to know where your time is actually generating return - and where it’s being eaten alive by logistics.

Run the math. Write it down. Bring it to your next board meeting. Let the numbers make the argument for you.

2.    Try a “Non-Event” This Year

This is one of my favorite things to teach, and it actually originated in our sector during the COVID years, and it blows people’s minds every time.

A non-event is exactly what it sounds like: you don’t hold the event. Instead, you send a letter (or an email, or a video, or a phone call) that says something like:

“This year, instead of asking you to buy a ticket, find a babysitter, put on uncomfortable shoes, and sit through a three-hour event on a Saturday night - we’re just going to ask you directly. Would you consider a gift of $250? No chicken. No auction. No house band playing a questionable cover of Olivia Rodrigo. Just your gift, going straight to the mission.”

You know what happens when you send that? People LOVE it.

They love it because you respected their time. You respected their Saturday night. You were honest. You were direct. And you removed every barrier between them and the mission.

Non-events regularly outperform actual events in net revenue because there are almost no expenses. No venue. No food. No coming up with activities to entertain guests. No random committee members arguing about centerpieces.

Just a compelling ask and a clear case for support.

And here’s the kicker: you can still do a small gathering for your top donors.

A house party. A cocktail reception. Something intimate and meaningful that costs $500 instead of $30,000.

You don’t have to go from gala to nothing.

You go from gala to intentional.

3.    If You Keep the Event, Change What “Success” Means

Maybe you’re not ready to kill the gala. Maybe your board will revolt. Maybe Phyllis will literally chain herself to the ballroom door. Who knows what shenanegans will happen!?

Fine. Keep the event.

But how about we change the definition of success?"

Stop measuring success by “how much we grossed.” Start measuring success by:

How many new donor relationships did we start? If someone attended your event and you don’t have their contact info, a follow-up plan, and a next step - the event failed. Period. A room full of people who had a nice time and then disappeared is not a fundraising success. It’s a party.

How many meaningful follow-up conversations happened within 48 hours? (Sound familiar? The 48-hour rule applies here too.) If your post-event plan is “send a thank-you email next week,” you’re leaving money and relationships on the table.

What’s the net - not the gross? And what was the cost per dollar raised? If you’re spending 70 cents to raise a dollar, that’s not fundraising. That’s a very expensive hobby.

Redefine success and suddenly the conversation shifts from “wasn’t that a great event?” to “did that event actually move our mission forward?” And if the answer is no - even if the centerpieces were faaaaabulous - you now have permission to do something different next year.

The event hamster wheel is one of the leading causes of nonprofit burnout.

And I don’t say that lightly.

I have watched brilliant, passionate, talented fundraisers leave the sector entirely because they spent years pouring their soul into events that ate their life and produced marginal returns. They didn’t leave because they stopped caring about the mission. They left because the mission got buried under logistics, committee meetings, and centerpiece debates.

That’s a tragedy. And it’s preventable.

You do not have to do more. 

You do not have to add another event. You do not have to make the gala bigger or fancier or more elaborate. In fact, the bravest thing you might do this year is make it smaller. Or simpler. Or gone.

The money is not in the event. The money is in the relationship. And the relationship doesn’t need 37 re-writes of the questionably stapled paper agenda-or-night-of-booklet that will end up in the trash while your guests prioritize double fisting gin & tonics staring at live auction items they won’t bid on.

It needs you. In the room. Being human. Asking directly.

That’s it. That’s the whole strategy.

OK, Your Turn!

I want to hear from you. Hit reply, send me a DM, flag me down at your next gala before the DJ starts playing - I don’t care. Tell me:

Have you ever killed an event? Or wanted to? What happened - or what’s stopping you?

Maybe you cancelled the golf tournament and raised more money with a letter campaign. Tell me that story - I’ll share it (with permission) so other folks can see what’s possible on the other side of the hamster wheel.

Maybe you KNOW your event is losing money but you don’t know how to have that conversation with your board. Tell me that too. I’ve had that conversation approximately one thousand times. I can help.

Send me your answer: patrick@dogoodbetterconsulting.com or just reply with INFO if you want to talk about getting off the event hamster wheel and raising more money with less stress.

And one more thing: we’re building something for fundraisers who are ready to stop doing more and start doing better. Do Good YOUniversity is getting a full overhaul -= new trainings, new community, new tools - and we’re opening early access soon. If you want to be first on the list, reply with EARLY ACCESS and I’ll make sure you’re in before anyone else.

Together, we’ve freaking got this!

-Patrick

P.S. This is one of a series of MAYDAY Distress Signals - real problems I hear from nonprofit pros every single week. The distress signals aren’t going anywhere. But neither is the help. More coming soon.